EMAN 620 – Information Technology in Emergency Management

Module # 4

Communications Technology Evaluation Exercise (CTE) Radios

Due at the end of Module # 4

Goal:

The goal of this exercise is to complete a communication technology evaluation (CTE) and make a decision on the best product to purchase. To accomplish this goal, you will follow the CTE process and template provided. Your deliverable is a document that captures the results of this exercise.

Background:

Technology Evaluation is standard practice in the business world. It is a simple methodology to perform a structured assessment of multiple tools in order to select one or decide against them. There are many published processes and templates that can be used, but there are commonalities among them to include:

· A structured process

· User defined criteria

· Rankings

For this exercise, you are provided a process and template for you to use. You are free to use an existing process or template that you find in your own research or develop one on your own.

Background:

The scenario is that you are the Emergency Manager for a large urban university. This university is spread over 10 miles and can have up to 30,000 people on the campus at one time. The campus faces many hazards such as tornados, floods, fires, and active shooters. Thus, a robust communication system is required for quickly communicating with staff. Staff are then to relay the message to anyone in their immediate area. Due to mountainous terrain and environmental factors this campus has a notoriously bad cellular infrastructure. There are many dead zones, and coverage is often spotty or not available at all. The bottom line is that cell phones are not reliable. As the Emergency Manager, you are responsible for designing and implementing the system to warn staff, students and others to an emergency. For this evaluation, your immediate task is only to communicate with the staff on campus.

Technology Requirements:

The technology you choose must be able to work in a network of over 100 physical units (Classrooms / Offices / Facilities) over a distance of 10 miles that does not rely on cell service to communicate. Communications have to be near instant. Some options include:

· Radios (specify the type)

· http://www.gotenna.com

· Firechat

· Beartooth

· THERE ARE MANY OTHER OPTIONS – Just go find them

Process:

1. Select Technologies. Select 3 or more technologies or products to evaluate.

2. Select Criteria. You must select the criteria for evaluation. You must select a minimum of 4 criteria. You must include at least 2 from the list below and come up with at least two of your own:

a. Price : The sticker price of the product

b. Cost: All the additional costs associated with implementation such as training, or additional hardware requirements.

c. Reliability: How often does this product fail or is not available?

d. Security / Encryption

e. Durability

3. Determine Weights: You must determine how important each criterion is to you and for the given task. For example, if reliability is the most important it should get the highest weight. Each weight is represented as a percentage (50% = .50). ALL WEIGHTS MUST ADD UP TO 100% or (1 on the sheet).

4. Rank. Now rank each technology by assigning a score of 1-10 for each criteria. There are no Zeroes. One is the lowest rank you can assign and ten is the highest. Therefore, as an example, a very reliable technology would get a 10 and an unreliable one might get a 1.

5. Sum. Now for each technology multiply the weight * rank for each criteria and add that to the following criteria. Continue until complete and you should get a score in the TOTAL SCORE cell. Do this for each technology.

6. Analyze. Determine which technology is ranked the highest. If they are tied or very close do some further analysis. Play with the weights and see if this changes anything.

7. Deliverable. Due at the end of week 4. On one page show your final evaluation table and provide responses to the following questions:

· What technologies did you select? Provide a very short description.

· What are your top 2 weighted criteria? Explain why did you select them?

· What technology do you recommend be selected for meeting the requirements and why?

Additional Notes:

· As best as possible use real data. If not available, then make any assumptions you need to complete the assessment. Note that the rank or weight you assign things can reflect your own uncertainty.

· You are welcome to write your response on the spreadsheet file or paste the spreadsheet into a word file. Just make it easy for me to read.

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